The winery is located in the municipality of Wiltingen in the German Moselle wine-growing region and is one of the oldest businesses on the Saar. It dates back to a Roman villa complex, fragments of which are still visible on the grounds today. In 1743, a monastic winery of the Luxembourg Jesuit College was built on the foundations. As a result of the French Revolution, the estate was secularised and eventually became the property of Gustav van Volxem, a brewer who had immigrated from Brussels. It was subsequently run by the Van Volxem family for four generations. In 1993, Peter Jordan took over the business and ran it under Jordan & Jordan. At the end of 1999, the estate was bought by Roman Niewodniczanski (scion of the Bitburger dynasty) and revived under the old name. He had previously studied economic geography and business administration. Large investments were made in vineyards with additional plots, buildings and cellars.
On the site of a former winery on the Wiltinger Schlossberg, a new manufactory was built with ecological and social sustainability in mind. The tower-like building, the "Monolith", is connected to the production underground through the wooden barrel cellar and includes a courtyard area with a sun terrace for visitors. The panorama lounge and the wine cellar can be used for festivities with up to 50 people. The vinotheque offers a spectacular panoramic view of the vineyards in the oxbow lake of the Saar. Since 2022, cellar master Christoph Friedrich and estate manager Lukas Becker have been responsible for the operation.
The vineyards cover 64 hectares of vines in the single vineyard sites Braunfels, Gottesfuß, Klosterberg, Kupp and Scharzhofberg (Wiltingen), Goldberg and Ritterpfad (Wawern), Altenberg (Kanzem), as well as Bockstein and Geisberg (Ockfen). The vineyards are already mentioned or included in the Prussian vineyard classification map "Saar und Mosel" from 1868. A special feature are 130-year-old and ungrafted Riesling vines in Gottesfuß. They are mainly planted with the Riesling variety, and the rest with Pinot Blanc and Chardonnay. Another six hectares are cultivated in the so-called "Saar Riesling Project" by contract winegrowers who have to work according to strict quality criteria. Environmentally friendly viticulture is consistently practised, for example, with no insecticides or synthetic fertilisers.
The extremely low yields average only 34 hectolitres per hectare. The grape harvest begins at the end of October at the earliest and lasts until December. Fermentation takes place spontaneously with the vineyard's own yeasts, followed by lees ageing in traditional large wooden barrels(Fuder). The wines are produced according to the four-stage VDP classification model. They are predominantly vinified dry. Most of the estate wines are vinified separately according to site and offered as quality wines or fruit-sweet Prädikat wines after fermentation. Two Rieslings are produced from the best sites, one from the entire area and a selection from the highest quality parcels. Bottle-fermented sparkling wines (also in magnum format), grape juice and a gin are also marketed. Around 300,000 bottles of wine are produced annually. The winery is a member of the VDP (Association of German Prädikat Wine Estates).
Pictures: Van Volxem/Wiltingen
